Sunday, October 6, 2013

Sunday snippets, or return of the proto-pickles...

in which our plucky heroine, though still being trompled by the Dread Rhinovirus, continues to make assorted progress around the homeplace...

The typographical infinity scarf that I have been busy for days hand rolling the edges is finally finished (girl, though insensibly fond of handwork, is not fond at all of tiny single thread stitching on springy silk); we finally got a break in the rain so I was able to get outside and photograph it, along with the stripey top. The silk chiffon scarf can also be worn doubled for a shorter cowl, which will be nice as it gets colder outside, and it is ideal for travel since it folds up to almost no space at all.

For those interested in the detailed how I made this, it was easy but tedious: the scarf was made from a half yard piece of 52" silk chiffon from Fabric Depot here in Portland, and to do a handrolled hem, I followed the instructions in this tutorial. Since the salesclerk tore the fabric on grain, all I needed to do to prep it was to carefully trim off the tiny whiskers along the torn edge a bit at a time before the handstitching... Once the two long raw edges were hemmed, I simply overlapped the selvedge ends about an eighth of an inch, and whipstitched them down on each side...

These are pieces two and three of my Autumn 4PAC/6PAC... (next up is a grey corduroy pinafore to replace the sadly missed bird pinafore, and a travel tote bag to be made up during the October SewAlong over at Stitcher's Guild)

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City Farm PDX, just down the road from me a few miles, has some of their fruit trees on sale for 50% to 75% off, and I can get a 'Oullins' greengage plum tree for $6, if I can get it home! Have arranged transport with a pal with a vehicle, and have been reading up about planting, and how to and when to suitably prune said plum...This will be a good addition to the backyard, 'tis supposedly a favorite sort of plum in England and Europe, and good for both preserving and eating fresh

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fingers crossed that the new batch of little pickled cucumbers will behave well (end up in the fridge and not in the compost like the last batch...) so far so good, it has been nine days and there is no mold, there is quite a bit of bubble formation, and the proto-pickles are turning a more olive color. I scalded the glass jar with boiling water this time, instead of just washing it well and I think that made a big difference.

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"In dark times, the definition of good art would seem to be art that locates and applies CPR to those elements of what’s human and magical that still live and glow despite the times’ darkness."

3 comments:

I envy you your scarf and, with your skills, am sure it is impeccably sown..

When I do a hand-rolled hem in chiffon, I machine sew, with a short stitch, a line of stitching about 1/2 inch from the cut edges. I anchor this edge under the presser foot (it acts as a third hand) and trim the 1/2 inch very close to the stitching as I roll the hem. Keeping the hem under tension as it is being sown helps tremendously to keep the edges straight and the machine stitching keeps the edge from stretching out of shape as well as making an easier-to-turn edge.